


A Small Price

by Mynameisdoubleg



Category: BattleTech: MechWarrior, Classic Battletech (Tabletop RPG)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-18 14:42:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29859663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mynameisdoubleg/pseuds/Mynameisdoubleg
Summary: A merchant captain is blackmailed into carrying a deadly cargo into Clan Ghost Bear-occupied space.





	A Small Price

_Solstice Spaceport, Twilight City_

_Morningside_

_Federated Commonwealth_

_17 May, 3055_

The holoscreen in the executive lounge was playing another retrospective on the Clan Invasion. Court historian Misha Auburn was burbling away.

“The death of ilKhan Leo Showers over Radstadt was a turning point,” she gushed. “The brave sacrifice of Kapten Tyra Miraborg of the Flying Drakøns, ramming her fighter into the bridge of the ilKhan’s ship, won the Inner Sphere a one-year reprieve and saved us from conquest and oppression by these warmongering savages.”

Karl Remus quickly turned away and sipped his drink. What did the Battle of Radstadt have to do with the man he was now? Nothing, nothing at all. No, he’d served his time in uniform. Served, and nearly died. _Drifting, his fighter crippled, until_. No. Never again.

There were more pleasant things to think about.

Like the lounge, for example. Karl was swaddled in the arching, curving, swooping, soft daeodon-skin chair. Everything in the lounge was soothing cream and natural tones, light dripped from diamond fixtures and sleek, shiny and slim attendants came around with pleasing alacrity to ensure his glass never went empty for long.

Pleasant things. Like the conclusion of today’s business. Let the small-time swindlers, smugglers and other crooks do their business in abandoned warehouses and darkened alleys. Your serious professional criminal did business in the lounge, in the boardroom, in the galaxy’s finest hotels, restaurants and resorts.

Karl tapped the holographic display on his timepiece and frowned a little, but without any real vigor. The downside of dealing with the elite was being made to wait. Well, time for another drink then. He raised his glass, rattled the ice and winked at the nearest attendant.

Beyond the attendant, Karl noticed two men in the blue and gold of spaceport security standing in the lounge doorway. One looked down at a dataslate in his hand, looked up, pointed at Karl, and the two begin to walk purposefully towards him. Karl briefly thought of the hold-out laser pistol tucked inside his jacket, and quickly dismissed the idea. He was no hero—he was a merchant, a businessman. Still smiling, Karl set his drink gently down and stood, adjusted his cuffs, turned on his heel and made smartly for the washrooms. Only to find another pair of guards bearing down on him from the other direction.

“Captain Karl Remus of the DropShip _Nellie Banks_?” the first guard asked softly, one hand on a sonic stunner holstered at her waist.

“Ah, there you are at last,” said Karl loudly. “Tch. Thought you people would never show up. Come on, let’s be on our way.” He motioned peremptorily for them to follow, and began to march back towards the exit to the lounge.

The guards exchanged sidelong looks, shrugged, closed around Karl as he sailed out the lounge with a smug smile on his face, aloof with pity for all those others in the lounge who couldn’t afford their own personal police escort. Appearances were important.

Once they’d all stepped outside, the guards slapped restraints around his wrists and hustled him out the building and into a waiting ground car. It wasn’t far to the police headquarters.

The room they left him in was considerably less salubrious than the lounge. The only furniture was his chair and a plain white table with three chairs on the other side. His tiny palm-sized pistol had been found, and sat forlornly on the table, its barrel pointed towards him almost accusingly. The walls of the room were bare and grey, the light did not so much drip as glare furiously down on him, and it seemed the absolute last thing on the plastic chair’s mind was anything to do with his comfort.

The uniformed guards who had first brought him here were quickly replaced by more senior police in sensible business suits, who were once again replaced by older men and women in more expensive suits, who had finally—and this is where things got really scary—been replaced by two men and a woman dressed in the most neutral clothing imaginable. No markers of status or position or income at all. Deliberately engineered to be as unremarkable and nondescript as possible.

“Mister ... Remus, isn’t it?” began one man, serious and thin-faced, tapping away at a noteputer. “Originally from Alshain. That correct?”

“Is that what your ‘puter says?” he asked lightly. They knew damn well who he was.

“Formerly a Lojtnant in the KungsArmé, now Captain of the independent DropShip ... _Nellie Banks_. Yes?”

“That’s the one on Landing Pad A-9,” put in the woman seated next to him, dressed in monotone black and white, like a waiter. Or an undertaker. “Danais-class, Rasalhague Republic registry.”

“Look, if that was all you wanted to know, you could have just, you know, asked me.”

The woman smiled thinly. “Upon inspection, the hold of your vessel was found to contain several hundred tons of military-grade electronics, including communications gear and targeting systems.”

Oh. Hell. “No kidding?”

“We have determined that the origin of these electronics was your homeworld, Alshain V, currently occupied by Clan Ghost Bear,” said the third man. Older than the other two, Karl guessed, with eyes that turned down slightly at the outside corners, giving him a permanently worried or anxious look.

“Lovely place, best skiing this side of Terra. Ever been?”

The third man shook his head sadly at the other two and ignored Karl’s question. “There is a total embargo on any trade in military technology with any world held by the Clans.”

“Now wait a minute,” Karl protested, leaning forward in his chair. “There’s no harm in trade _from_ the occupation zones, surely? I’m taking stuff _out_ of the zones, not putting it in.”

It was the first man’s turn to speak again: “Punishment for breaking the embargo is up to 10 years in prison, confiscation of all property used to commit the crime and a fine of up to 50 million C-Bills.”

“Hey, you can’t blame a guy for trying to make a profit, can you?” Karl’s eyes scanned left and right, searching their faces for some crack, some trace of humanity. “Can you?”

“Open and shut case,” said the woman.

“War profiteering? In the current political climate? They’ll throw the book at him,” the third man said, still morose and regretful. “They’ll take his ship, plus 10 and 50, guaranteed.”

“What war profiteering?” Karl squeaked, then brought his voice under control. “There is no war! There’s a truce. We’re at peace!”

“Wish there was something we could do,” shrugged the first man. He closed the display of his noteputer, and made as though to stand up. He stopped, as though struck by a thought. “Unless...”

Ah, here it comes, Karl thought sourly. The shakedown. What would it be this time: Bribes for the local governor? A promise to get hold of some special contraband? He’d been through this on more remote systems, but never thought it would happen on one of the core worlds of the Commonwealth. People are people, no matter the planet, he figured. “Oh dear, oh deary, dear me,” he sighed theatrically. “Can you not help me, my friends?” He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Oh whatever can I possibly do to make it up to you? Five percent? 10?”

“We’re serious, Mister Remus,” said the older, morose man.

“That’s a crime that doesn’t hurt just one person,” mused the woman. “It hurts the whole realm.”

“Okay, okay, 15.”

“You still don’t understand. You can’t buy your way out of this,” said the sad-faced man. “No, I think you owe the Federated Commonwealth, Mister Remus. You owe the realm a favor.”

Karl’s eyes narrowed. “What kind of favor?” He studied the three again. “What do you want?”

“It’s just a simple task, Mister Remus, just one small shipment.” The sad-faced man tried to smile. It didn’t suit him. “A small price to pay.”

Well, that didn’t seem so bad. “Hey, I’d be glad to help,” Karl said insincerely. “What and where to?”

“As to what, frankly we won’t tell you,” the first man replied. “Not yet, anyway.”

“As to where, it’s somewhere you know quite well, somewhere you’ve been quite recently, somewhere you’ve already proven you can get in and out of,” the woman added. “Mister Remus, we want you to pay another visit to Alshain.”

_Solar Observation and Jump Detection Base Zulu-Nine_

_Khepri (Moon of Morningside IV)_

_Federated Commonwealth_

_22 May, 3055_

They took off with a hold packed with freeze-dried foodstuff, their ostensible cargo, and a bridge packed with laser- and stunner-armed military police. Twelve hours later, they touched down at the small base on the far side of Khepri, Morningside’s moon. The moon was a crater-pocked ball of rock and dirty water ice, and the base consisted mainly of an enormous dish pointed towards the system’s star and jump points, along with a low and squat control center, residential and storage buildings, all half-buried in the ice.

A boarding bridge telescoped out from the main building and connected with one of the _Nellie Banks_ ’s airlocks. The airlock hissed open, revealing a dimly-lit, dusty and empty corridor. The security guards filed out, floating past Karl and his crew in the moon’s microgravity without a word or glance, save only for a Sergeant’s curt order to “wait here.” Leaving Karl and his crew hanging from handholds by the airlock, staring after the guards’ receding boot soles until they were swallowed by distance and darkness.

“I say we shut the airlock, blast the gangway and take off,” said Karl’s First Officer, a stocky and thickly-bearded Circinian named Willie Kramb. “Make a run for the jump point and head to the Combine.”

“We don’t have a JumpShip,” Karl pointed out. “Besides, we made a deal.”

“No offense, but _you_ made a deal, Captain, we didn’t have any say in the matter,” Willie retorted. “You can stay here if you like. Rest of us are bugging out the first chance we get. This thing stinks, Karl. Smuggling cargo into Ghost Bear space? Either we succeed, and the FC kills us to keep it quiet, or we fail, and the Ghost Bears blow us into vacuum. No way this has a happy ending for us, Captain.”

A noise from down the gangway prevented Karl from answering. Figures appeared in the distance, gliding along from handhold to handhold. Four figures, two men, two women. All four of them looked like they had stepped straight from a bodybuilding contest. ‘Fit’ did not begin to cover it—they swam through the dusty air with the easy and powerful grace of a pod of killer whales. Karl waited patiently until they slowed to a stop just outside the airlock.

One of the women was at the front of the group, with a face that reminded him a little of someone he’d known in the service. Wasn’t a happy memory. Automatically, Karl extended his hand in welcome, and found it immediately caught in a crushing grip. He winced and the woman’s wide mouth twitched into a wolfish smile.

“And who might you be?” he asked.

“We’re your cargo,” she said, giving his hand a final squeeze. “My name is ... Anna White. These are my ... associates, Grigori Black, Mahesh Green and Chun-hua Grey.”

“Charmed,” Karl said, extracting what was left of his hand from the woman’s grip. “Nice to meet you, Miss Nondescript Obvious-Alias. Welcome aboard. Do you have any baggage?”

Anna nodded. “There is one container. We will load it personally into your cargo bay. You will give us the passkey to the bay and none of your personnel will enter it. We require the use of the passenger accommodations. Again, our deck will be off-limits to your crew. You may show us there now.” She leaned close, and her height forced Karl to tilt his head upwards to maintain eye contact. “I trust this is quite acceptable?”

“Fantastic,” murmured Karl. “Ideal.” He turned to Willie and the rest of the crew. “Dismissed. Come on Miss White, this way.”

The crew floated away, muttering among themselves. Willie sniffed loudly and pinched his nose, looking significantly at Karl. “Stinks,” he mouthed, and then followed the rest of the crew towards the bridge.

Karl rolled his eyes in response, and led the way up the DropShip’s central access tube, his four megamuscular guests close behind.

“Alright, Miss White or whatever your name is,” Karl said over his shoulder. “Mind telling me what I’m supposed to be doing?”

“My team will pose as members of your crew,” she replied. “You will take us and our ... baggage to the Alshain system and through Ghost Bear in-system patrols and ground-based security. Once on the ground, you will assist us to disembark from the DropShip without alerting their security forces and we will conduct our mission. That is all.”

Something was missing there. “You don’t need us for the return trip?”

Anna did not immediately respond. Karl looked over at her again, and saw her face harden, brow tense with determination. “No,” she said. “That will not be necessary.”

Oh, Karl thought, she really _did_ remind him of someone he’d known. A memory: _His fighter crippled, drifting. The darkness of space broken by a sudden and deadly spear of light_. Maybe Willie was right, they should’ve blasted off while they had the chance.

The foursome locked the cargo bay and loaded their “baggage,” and as promised, spent virtually all of their time on their deck. One of them was always on the bridge, coiled like a serpent, hooded eyes watching the crew’s every move.

It was a number of jumps from Morningside to Alshain—Meacham, Grumium, Tukkayid and then into the Ghost Bear occupation zone, Altenmarkt. The dark shadow of a Ghost Bear warship circled warily at the edge of sensor range, interrogating them about their destination and cargo.

Karl was aware of Grigori Black at his shoulder during the conversation, a shovel-sized hand on the back of Karl’s chair. Tension pressed down on Karl even in zero gravity, as though he were in an ancient submarine at the bottom of a blue-water ocean. As though the whole ship might implode under the impossible pressure of it all.

Willie cracked first.

It was the middle of a sleep cycle, the DropShip under thrust, transferring between JumpShips, from House Mailai’s _The Velocity of Money II_ to the Ghost Bear’s _Wait and See_ —the Ghost Bears would only allow their own vessels to travel among stars inside the zone. Karl tossed on his bunk, forearm over his eyes, lost in dreams of floating, cold, in darkness, stars glittering like snake scales all around him, until a sound woke him.

It was Willie, knocking on the hatch to Karl’s cabin, face pinched and intent. “Time we found out what cargo we’re really carrying,” he said, holding up a duplicate red passcard. Karl hesitated, then remembered his dream. He nodded, and levered himself from the cot.

The cargo hold was cold, their breath clouding about their mouths. There were serried rows of cargo containers, strapped and fastened down, bearing the logos and names of agro conglomerates. In the back, near the curve of the hull, was another container, outwardly the same as all the others.

“This one,” said Willie, pointing. “Isn’t on the manifest from Morningside. Some kind of scanner-resistant coating or material inside.”

Willie unlocked and rolled up the shutter across the mouth of the container. Boxes of rice and beans were stacked inside But deeper inside, at the very back, were four upright metal sarcophagi, nearly three meters tall by two meters wide, two meters high. Unmarked save for the seam of their lids, and a computer lockpad. Willie rolled up his sleeves and knelt by the lock of the nearest unit.

“A-a-are you sure this is a good idea?” Karl asked Willie, teeth chattering, whether from the cold or nerves, he couldn’t say.

“No, I told you, I think it’s a malking rotten idea,” retorted Willie, tongue between his teeth in concentration, focused on the lock. “We should dump the color-coded lot of them out the airlock and forget we’ve ever been to Morningside, pretend we don’t know what the word ‘morning’ means, insist we are completely ignorant of the whole concept of sidereal time.” There was a click from the sarcophagus. “It’s open.”

The lid swung wide. Inside was something a bit like Frankenstein’s monster, if Frankenstein had been a metallurgist rather than a doctor. It was metal, human-shaped but huge, bulky and angular, with what looked like the barrel of a weapon replacing the right arm below the elbow, the left arm ending in a wicked-looking claw, with a bulky backpack looming over its shoulders.

“Sheee-yit,” breathed Willie.

“Yeah,” agreed Karl. Then, “What is it?”

“Battle armor,” said a voice behind them.

Karl closed his eyes briefly and swore under his breath before turning around. “Miss White,” he said, as pleasantly as he could. The muscular woman stood in the entrance to the cargo container, nearly filling it completely. Karl felt inside his jacket. Yes, the hold-out laser pistol was there. “What a surprise.”

“Silent alarm on the lock. I am disappointed in you, Captain Remus. We did ask you to stay out,” Anna admonished.

“I don’t think the person smuggling weapons into the Ghost Bear capital gets to lecture us about trust,” Karl snapped. “This isn’t just an infiltration or spying mission. What are you people doing?”

“Can’t you see, they’re a fracking hit squad, Karl,” Willie snarled. “And we get to be the dupes, the mules.” Suddenly, there was a knife in his hand. “Out of the way, lady. We’re turning this ship around.”

Anna shook her head. With a growl, Willie launched himself at her. One of her hands snapped up, caught his wrist. Her other hand smashed into the bottom his elbow, bending it upwards with a crunch. Willie’s growl turned into a howl of pain. Anna easily pried the knife from his hand, grabbed him by the throat and drew the knife back for a strike.

“Please don’t,” Karl said mildly. The barrel of his laser pistol millimeters from Anna’s temple.

“Is that little thing even real, or just a toy?” she asked, still holding Willie by the neck, knife still in her hand.

“Only one way to find out.”

Anna grunted, loosened her hand, and let the still-bawling Willie slump to the floor of the container. “Now what?” she asked.

“First, Willie gets himself to the infirmary. Go on, Willie.” Willie scrambled up, cringing, keeping his distance from Anna. He snarled as though to say something, but one look from Anna dissuaded him. He settled for spitting on the container floor, then ran out the opening. “Next, you tell me what is really going on here,” Karl continued, taking a step back, out of the reach of the woman’s powerful arms.

“You know I can’t tell you that, Remus. Come on, you were a soldier once.”

“Was,” he agreed. “Past tense.” He nodded in the direction Willie had gone scuttling off. “But even if I was, Willie’s right, even soldiers don’t blindly follow orders. If this mission of yours might get us killed, I think we have a right to know.”

Anna pursued her lips, hefted the knife in her hand, thoughtfully. As though testing the weight and balance. Just when Karl was sure she was about to hurl it at him, she spoke: “The FedCom high command has authorized a kinetic operation. A surgical strike targeting leadership elements of the invading Clans.”

“Kinetic operation? You mean an assassination.”

“I know what I mean. The euphemism was for your comfort, not mine, _civilian_. Khan Bjorn Jorgensson and Aletha Kabrinski are currently on Alshain. We are going to eliminate the Khan and saKhan of Clan Ghost Bear.”

Karl was shocked enough to lower his pistol. Anna made no move, only kept her gaze locked on him, challenging. “That’s suicide,” he breathed.

“Perhaps, perhaps not. Sometimes though, the sacrifice is worth it,” Anna said, with a touch of pride. “The Inner Sphere was only saved by the sacrifice of Tyra Miraborg. The Clans’ technology is more advanced, their soldiers more determined and more disciplined. The exposure of their leadership and time-consuming selection process are their weaknesses. Kill a Khan, and the entire Clan is paralyzed. Radstadt showed us that. Tyra showed us that. _You_ showed us that, Remus. Kill a Khan, and the Clan has to freeze operations and go through the lengthy process of choosing a successor.” Anna frowned at him. “Come on, Remus, I shouldn’t have to tell you. You were _there_ , at Radstadt, part of Fenrir squadron and—”

“And I know what it cost,” Karl said. _Memories of drifting, cold, alone in space, alive only thanks to luck, luck and one woman’s sacrifice. A single life, a small price to pay for so much gain. And yet, too much_. “Fine, say you succeed. You take out both Khans. And then what?”

“And then we kill the next Khan, and the next one, we keep taking out their leaders until they either retreat from the Inner Sphere, or fall to pieces when nobody wants the death sentence of being Khan anymore.”

“That’s it? That’s the strategy?” For a brief, unworthy moment he wished Tyra had failed. Then nobody would be seeking to ‘honor’ her sacrifice by repeating it. In making a hero out of her, they’d made her a role-model, someone to admire rather than pity. But he didn’t think the Inner Sphere was ready for that conversation yet. So instead, he asked: “Why the Ghost Bears? They’re no threat to the Federated Commonwealth.”

“Every Clan is a threat to every realm. But no, you are right. In this case, our goal is proof of concept: Prove it is possible and effective. The Ghost Bears are isolated from FedCom space, so in the event our mission ... does not achieve its objectives, it will be difficult for the Clan to conduct reprisals.”

Which also answered the question of why the Federated Commonwealth was using a neutral, independent merchantman for this operation rather than someone known and trusted—plausible deniability. Nothing to trace him back to their high command. Before Karl could respond, his communicator beeped for attention. “We’re approaching the _Wait and See_ , sir,” crackled the voice of the navigator. “They’re sending a skiff to inspect us.”

Karl locked gazes with Anna. She arched an eyebrow, held up the knife. “Understood,” Karl said into the communicator. “I’ll be up in two shakes.” He thumbed the device off.

“Not a word,” Anna warned. “If I think you’re betraying us, we’ll kill your entire crew, I swear it. We’re not afraid to die.”

“No, I know. More’s the pity.”

The Ghost Bear boarding party was led by Star Commander Duane. On his journeys in and out of the occupation zone, Karl had met Duane on a number of occasions—an older MechWarrior, transferred to customs inspection and security duties either as punishment or because his superiors couldn’t think of anything else to do with him.

“Back again so soon, merchant?” Duane asked as soon as he stepped through the airlock. His hair was streaked with grey at the temples, he walked with a limp and was dressed in the standard Ghost Bear winter camouflage fatigues, with digitized fractal patterns of white, blue and grey. A massive pulse laser pistol rode at his hip, barrel extending nearly to his knee. Another fourteen men crowded through the airlock behind him, a mix of Rasalhague natives and freeborn Clansmen.

“The duty of the merchant caste is to enrich their clan,” Karl said, hands spread in helpless acceptance of fate. “Would you have me deny my duty?”

“I would have you stay silent, _stravag_ ,” Duane grunted, but the epithet was automatic, routine, there was no force to his insult. Duane swept his eyes over Karl’s crew, lined up in the corridor outside the airlock. His gaze lingered over Anna and her three companions. “You have some new faces among your crew, too.”

“To help with moving the cargo,” Karl replied, but Duane had already lost interest and turned away.

“Search the quarters and cargo bays,” Duane ordered his men. “You,” he pointed to Karl, drawing his pulse pistol. “You stick close and come with me. You and … that one.” He pointed to Anna.

Duane led them down to the cargo bay, and kept the two of them covered as his men searched through the containers. Karl watched as they drew closer to the one holding the power armor. Anna tense at his side. The Clanners probably would not spot anything. This was routine, the men barely paying attention to what they were doing. Duane looked bored and cold and miserable.

They might not spot anything. Probably not. One man was almost at the container now.

If they did find something, Anna and the others would attack, and Karl and his crew would almost certainly die in the crossfire. Sacrifices, for their glorious, pointless, hopeless mission.

“Tell you what, Star Commander, let’s make this interesting,” Karl said suddenly, forcing a smile. There was a gamble to be made here, one that might save them all. “Do you see that container over there, by that man? I will give it to you.”

“Give it to me?” Duane echoed, suspicious.

Anna’s fingers clamped on Karl’s shoulder like iron. “Karl, what the—”

Karl held up a hand to silence Anna. You couldn’t bribe a Clanner with money, but a ‘bribe’ was just a fancy way to describe giving someone something they wanted, but couldn’t have. “Sure, give it to you,” he nodded. “All you need to do is win it. In a Trial of Possession.”

“A Trial, against a freebirth? Against you?” Duane laughed, but Karl caught a gleam in the man’s eye. A challenge, danger, a chance for combat, even a glorious death (even here, the shadow of Tyra lingered) these were things Duane yearned for every day without hope of ever having those yearnings met. “Ah, you might have been a warrior once, freebirth, but old and useless as I am, I will still snap you like a twig.”

“Oh, not me,” Karl grinned, turning and patting Anna on the shoulder, ignoring her mix of puzzlement and anger. “For this Trial, I bid Petty Officer Anna White.”

Duane’s gaze shifted, eyes widened slightly as he considered Anna again, as though seeing her height and powerful build for the first time, and then he chuckled. “Ah, now I see your game.” He did not look upset. Rather, he was still smiling. “Like all good merchant caste, you offer me a trade, something I want for something you want. The taste of danger and combat again for me, in exchange for allowing you to commit whatever petty little crime your freeborn brain has dreamed up.”

“If we win,” Karl nodded, unapologetic. “If we lose, then you get the container.”

“Of course,” Duane allowed, then looked calculatingly at Anna. “Although the Star Captain would be upset with me if I let you wriggle through my fingers with your wormy little plan. And for that reason, much as I might wish otherwise, I cannot accept the batchall myself. I bid Point Commander Ram.” He tapped his communicator. “Ram, report to the lower cargo bay.”

As they waited, Anna leaned close to Karl’s ear. “If you’re betraying us, I told you, I’m willing to—” she hissed.

“Yes, yes, murder is your solution to every problem, I remember. But are you willing to trust me?” he whispered back. “Win this Trial, and they are honor-bound to allow us to keep the cargo inviolate until we arrive. No matter how many more checkpoints we pass through, no Clansman can challenge us. We’ll have clear sailing all the way to Alshain.”

Anna chewed the thought over slowly. “But if I lose—”

“Then don’t.”

Ram turned out to be, if not a full-blooded Elemental, then of that gene stock: Nearly two meters tall, every inch of it corded with muscles as sharply defined as an anatomical drawing. He did not smile when Duane explained the Trial, merely nodded his head, cracked his neck from side to side and flexed his tree-trunk arms. “Ready whenever,” he said.

Duane’s men and Karl’s crew formed a circle in the hold, around the two fighters. Ram shuffled, cautious, like a fighter with little experience in low-gravity combat, but it might not matter, given his greater reach. Low-gravity martial arts were all about grappling, holds and chokes, and perhaps Ram’s size would give him the advantage. On the other hand, Anna was doubtless a trained killer, and looked cool, confident in the face of her ogrish opponent.

Ram might win, Anna might win. It honestly didn’t matter to Karl.

If she won, then they would go on to Alshain, and he would have to think of another plan to keep them alive. If she lost, then this madness ended here. The Ghost Bears would take possession of the Power Armor, but without further repercussions—Anna would have paid with her life, and Clan culture held the results to be final. The other three commandoes might still object, but they’d be off-balance, leaderless, and Karl would at least have the chance to defuse the situation.

He did feel a twinge of sympathy for Anna White, knowing her bravery and courage were being used by her commanders, and now used again by him, everyone using them to pull her strings and make her do what they wanted her to do.

Let that be a lesson for people who celebrated martyrdom, who made a fetish out of self-sacrifice.

Anna White wanted to lay down her life for the Federated Commonwealth? Fine, let her be a sacrifice. Only, her sacrifice would not lead to more death, but instead to less, and more life for himself and his crew. It was a small enough price to pay.


End file.
